Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
“You’re a fucking idiot,” Joey snarled as Anson sat in the armchair next to the fire.
“I’m an idiot? She was taking notes on me! Clearly, she’s planning on selling a story to the tabloids. This whole thing has likely been all one elaborate lie.”
Maybe she’d never planned to go to Caldwell’s place. Anson might have been her endgame all along. And now all of his secrets were going to end up public knowledge. All of his pain and his failures.
Fuck.
He couldn’t stand that everyone would know.
They’d know how far he had fallen.
Is that really the problem? Is it the world seeing the truth of your existence that’s the issue?
Or is it the fact that she betrayed you?
He hadn’t seen it. Had been completely blindsided.
“She pretended to be so innocent,” he spat out. “Sweet and kind. God, she was a good actor. I thought she didn’t recognize me.”
Which made him an even bigger idiot.
“Because maybe she didn’t,” Joey told him as the door opened.
For one moment, his heart gave a leap thinking that it was going to be Alice. Instead, Miles walked into the cabin.
You drove her away. Why would she return?
And good riddance too. He hoped that she had some semblance of a conscience left. That she might feel just a tiny bit of guilt.
“I can’t believe I was so fucking stupid as to believe her story.” He ran his hand over his face. “Gonna have to contact my shithead of a lawyer and see if there’s anything that can be done to stop this story.”
“That shithead of a lawyer is our best friend,” Miles said mildly.
“He’s still a shithead,” he grumbled. “Charges an arm and a leg. Joey, pass me my phone, will you? It’s on the table.”
“What?”
“Will you pass me my phone? My leg fucking hurts and I don’t want to get up.”
“Um, sure.” Joey shot a look at Miles.
“What?” Anson barked.
“Nothing,” Joey said quickly as he grabbed his phone and handed it to Anson.
“What?” Anson asked again.
“You just never ask me to do anything,” Joey said quietly.
“That a problem?” Anson asked grouchily. “If it is, I won’t ask again.”
“Don’t be an asshole,” Miles told him. “You know it’s not a fucking problem. Christ, we’ve spent so much time trying to get you to ask us for anything . . . only for you to throw that back in our face. You can give us a few minutes to get used to the Anson who asks for help. Right?”
“Just wanted my damn phone.” But there was a twinge of something inside him . . . something that felt like guilt.
Maybe gratitude.
These guys hadn’t left him. They hadn’t abandoned him even when they should have. Even when he was being a complete asshole.
Which was pretty much always.
“Is this what you found?” Joey held up the book that was on the table.
“Yep. Found it in her room. She’s made notes about this place. About me.”
Joey frowned as he looked through the book. “Ever thought that this wasn’t notes about you, but a diary?”
“Who writes a diary like that?” Although he hadn’t actually looked beyond what she’d written about him. “Is there other stuff in there?”
“Yeah, I don’t think it’s a diary exactly. More like ideas and thoughts? She’s got . . . she’s . . . shit . . .” Joey read some more and irritation flooded him.
Why hadn’t he read the rest of the damn book?
Idiot.
“Well?” he demanded.
“Um.” Joey glanced up at him, then other to Miles. “You know, I think Miles should take this and put it somewhere safe. In case Alice wants it back.”
“No fucking way. Give it here.” Anson held out his hand.
“No,” Joey said. “It’s not yours. It’s Alice’s.”
“It’s in my house and Alice is mine so it’s mine,” Anson said.
Wait.
What the fuck did he just say?
“Alice is yours?” Miles asked.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” he said hastily.
Both men shared looks.
“And don’t do that,” he demanded.
“Do what?” Miles asked.
“Share a look where you think that I’m losing it. That’s your ‘how can we manage Anson’ look. And I’m sick of seeing those looks. No one has to handle me. I’m a grown man who can take care of himself.” Frustration bit at him.
“No one wants to treat you like a child,” Miles said. “We want to help you. If it was the other way around, if one of us was injured and needed help, wouldn’t you be there to help?”
Of course he would.
“It’s just not easy to accept help,” he managed to get out.
“We know that,” Miles said. “And we’re not trying to be in your face with it. But we just want to do what we can to make your life easier.”
Anson stared into the fire. “My life won’t be the same again.”
“No,” Miles said, coming to sit across from him. “But that doesn’t mean that it can’t be a good life.”
Anson made a scoffing noise. But he had to force it. Because for the first time, he thought that maybe it would be possible to have a good life. Might not be the one he’d planned . . . but that didn’t mean it couldn’t be something with purpose, a life that was full and enjoyable.
A life that would be better with Alice in it.
“What else is in that book?” he asked Joey.
Joey sighed and then handed it over. Anson looked through it. Something, he realized, that he should have done before he’d gone off at her.
Before he’d driven her away.
He opened the front of the book.
Alice’s Story Ideas.
“Story ideas?” he whispered.
“Was she an author?” Joey asked. “I don’t mean a reporter or that she’s going to sell a story to the tabloid. I mean . . . could she have been writing a fictional story?”
“She didn’t say she wrote stories. And why does she list out the attributes of a narcissist?
” Anson asked. Then he looked at another page.
His breath froze in his lungs and he forced himself to push it out.
“She’s got notes on emotional and financial abuse.
” But they weren’t just listed. There were examples.
What seemed to be quite detailed examples.
Anson swallowed around the lump in his throat.
“What is it?” Miles asked.
“She has examples of financial and emotional abuse and they . . . they don’t seem generic.”
“What are you saying?” Miles asked.
Anson thought about showing it to his best friend. Miles was the sheriff. He’d have seen and heard worse. But this seemed personal.
“It’s like she knows something about that sort of abuse. As though they are things that might have happened to her,” Joey said. “But she could have done some good research. She might have talked to other people who had experienced that sort of abuse.”
Joey was right. That could be the case.
But he just knew that it wasn’t.
“She was always apologizing,” he said. “Even when she did nothing wrong. Always worried about me getting mad at her for doing something wrong. Fuck, how did I not see it?”
“You can’t know for sure,” Miles told him.
He did know it, though. He could feel it deep inside. Some asshole had abused her.
“Her ex,” he said. “She said that she’d had a messy break-up. She told me that when she was trying to reassure me that she didn’t want a relationship.”
Right before he’d fucked her. And then kicked her out.
God. What a fucking asshole he was.
“I was an asshole to a woman who did nothing but try to help me,” he said hoarsely. “A woman who was in an abusive relationship before she came here. And I kicked her out and told her to never come back. Told her that I never wanted to see or hear from her again.”
Why did he do that? Why hadn’t he given her a chance to explain herself?
“I was so eager to find a reason to get rid of her. I was just waiting for her to fail because she seemed too perfect. And when I found it, it felt like a relief, almost. Because there had to be something wrong with her. So I jumped on it without questioning it. Fuck. I’m the worst kind of person. Even more of an asshole than Lochlan.”
“So we find her and you apologize,” Joey said, pacing back and forth. “Have you got any idea where she might have gone? We could call her.”
“I don’t have it.”
“What?” Miles asked. “You don’t have her phone number?”
“Why would I have needed it?” he asked grouchily. “She was staying here and when I kicked her out I didn’t exactly ask for her phone number.”
“Fine. Then do you have any idea of where she was going?” Joey asked.
“If you want to find her, that is,” Miles added.
“You do, don’t you?” Joey asked. “She was perfect for you. Sweet and kind and caring. She didn’t betray you.”
No, it seemed like she hadn’t.
But maybe he should just let her go.
“She could find someone better,” he muttered.
Fuck it felt wrong to say that, though. Because he didn’t want her with someone else.
He wanted her with him.
She’d only been gone a day and he already missed her so much that it hurt. It was a deep ache inside him, an itch that he couldn’t get rid of. That grew with every moment that passed without her here.
So why the fuck are you hesitating?
Go and find her.
“Yeah, sure, she could also go find another asshole like the one she was obviously with before she came here. But, hey, what does that matter, right? Not like you actually cared about her,” Joey said hotly.
Anson saw red as anger flooded him. The idea of her being with someone who would hurt and abuse her . . . it made him furious.
That wouldn’t happen again . . . would it?
But it might. Alice was so trusting. So optimistic and caring. It wouldn’t take much for her to trust the wrong person and end up in a bad place once again.
Unless he was there to protect her. Take care of her.
Can’t do that if you’re here and she’s off somewhere else.
But if he went after her . . . he had to be prepared for what that meant.
Opening himself up to someone else.
Caring about them. Putting them before himself. He couldn’t be the man he’d once been. He hated that he needed help with things that had once come so easily.
But Alice had never seemed to care. She hadn’t treated him like a child or as though he was less. Anson didn’t know whether he still had it in him to love someone else. But he did know that he wanted to try.
That he wanted to do better than he had been. For her.
“We need to find her,” he stated.